


Somewhere to Belong

by fineinthemorning



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Character Death, Emotional Manipulation, Established Relationship, Grief/Mourning, Haunting, Horror, M/M, Manipulative Relationship, Possession, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-06-26 05:52:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19761922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fineinthemorning/pseuds/fineinthemorning
Summary: Akira seems to be the only person to grieve for Akechi Goro after his death. Is that why he's the only person drawing connections between the the deceased detective and the strange things happening around Leblanc? Could it be the Metaverse that's responsible for the chill in the air and the blood on his hands, or is it something far more sinister?





	Somewhere to Belong

“Hey, Morgana, is it okay if I just . . . have some time alone tonight?”

The not-cat jumped out of the bag and onto the counter of Leblanc, turning to face Akira with bright blue eyes, “If that’s really what you need right now . . .”

Akira nodded, confirming whatever Morgana assumed of him. He couldn’t say aloud what he needed because what he needed at this point was impossible.

“You could invite Yusuke over? It would have been better to say something earlier though . . .”

“Thanks. I’ll text Futaba to let her know you’re coming.”

“Okay, goodnight Akira.”

He nodded again, opening the door to the cafe to watch the cat scamper out. He locked it behind him, pulled out his phone to follow through on his promise, and let his knees give out from under him. 

It was a shame, lying on Leblanc’s hard-wood floor with his cheek to the smooth surface. He’d cleaned the floor so many times, but even with that, he knew how dirty it was. In this moment, however, he couldn’t be bothered to care. 

Everything hurt. 

Most of all, his heart. 

But the heart was the single most important muscle, and as such, the pain that stemmed from there beat relentlessly through his veins to the rest of his body.

He’d failed.

Tonight, he’d let someone die.

Akechi Goro’s life was in his hands, and he’d let it slip through his fingers. 

He rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling as a rare car passed on the street outside, bright headlights casting crystal light on the ceiling and into the interior of Leblanc. 

He began to replay the evening in his mind. 

The confrontation. The battle. The cognition. The doors. The promise. 

The silence.

The silence he didn’t even bother investigating. The doors he didn’t even attempt to tear down. The cognition he should have shot when he had the chance. The battle that never should have happened. The confrontation that could have been avoided.

If he had tried.

If he had been honest.

If he had been anything better than what he was-- a better leader or friend or person, even.

Akira closed his eyes, but he did not sleep.

* * *

What felt like hours later, he stood up in the darkness of the cafe he could navigate blindfolded and walked around the counter to turn on the bar lights. They hung low, and were dark, but they were enough to make a cup of Blue Mountain coffee with sugar and a touch of condensed milk, the way Akechi Goro loved it but no one else seemed to appreciate.

He looked at the seat, second from his left, where the detective prince used to sit and now, where he’d never sit again. He imagined how his hair would look darker under the yellow light but his eyes would be brighter. He’d smile, small and grateful, a rare smile that Akira practically had to sell his soul for to see. 

“Thank you, Kurusu-kun, for the coffee.”

“Thank you for the company,” he’d said at one point, which had merely been a passing dismissal on his part but had earned a blushing detective nonetheless. 

“You always know just what to say, don’t you?”

Akira had merely smiled. He never knew what to say. He’d never known, which was why he so often kept silent around the detective. Unlike his friends or confidants, he was too difficult to read. Akechi Goro was indecipherable. Impossible. 

Akira blinked and stared at the empty space clouded only by the steam that rose up from the coffee mug sitting lonely on the counter. 

Akechi wasn’t here; he would never be here again.

He was dead.

And so, finally, alone in his despair, Akira cried. 

* * *

Too broken to throw the coffee out, he headed up stairs to leave it alone on the counter. If he were lucky, it wouldn’t be there the next day because Sojiro would take care of it before he could be reminded . . . not that, at least in this moment, he believed he’d ever forget.

In bed, he hugged his single pillow in his arms, curled around it as more sobs racked his body. He’d be better in the morning. He’d be ready to fulfill his promise.

Goro’s dying wish.

But right now, he was just a boy with the weight of death on his shoulders, finding it desperately hard to move on from the mistakes that could never be undone.

* * *

Downstairs, a mug of luke-warm coffee sat soundlessly, liquid swirling in a small storm that settled once white, sweetened condensed milk floated up to the top, separating from the coffee entirely. 

* * *

“Hey, kid,” Sojiro greeted Akira the next day as he came down the stairs. 

“Good morning,” he replied automatically, failing to hide his exhaustion but succeeding in hiding his grief.

With a stern voice, Sojiro scolded him in the gravelly way only men past their prime could master, “You left a sour cup of coffee downstairs. You know better than that.”

“Sorry,” Akira replied half-heartedly as he sat down beside Goro’s seat, third from the left. He was glad he hadn’t come downstairs to see the mug waiting for him, but last night he hadn’t considered that Sojiro would simply bring it up anyway since leaving a dish out was about as bad as a criminal offense on his watch. 

And so, Akira was reminded all over again of the events the day before. 

The events he’d let happen.

The death he’d let happen.

“It’s fine,” Sojiro interrupted his thoughts, “ . . . did something happen?”

Akira considered the question a moment too long. He couldn’t be honest and incriminate him, but if he looked anywhere near as bad as he felt, then he damn sure couldn’t lie, either. “Yeah,” he started, “but I . . . don’t want to think about it.”

“Is it anything I can help?”

Akira shook his head.

“Fine, then. I won’t bother ya, but if you just need an ear or something, I’m here.”

Akira nodded, “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it, but remember to pick up your dishes next time, okay? That was the damndest thing seeing milk curdled at the top.”

“What?” He hadn’t heard right, surely.

“In the mug you left sitting out, milk was curdled on the top. I’ve never seen a thing like it. I checked the milk and the carton and it was fine.”

“Oh . . .” Akira didn’t know what to make of it; he didn’t even care, really. It wasn’t as if it would bring Goro back. 

“Here, have some coffee to wake ya up. I’ll get some curry heated up.” 

“Thanks.”

Sojiro nodded with something of a grimace and walked back into the kitchen area to find leftover curry in the fridge. 

Akira was once again left alone to his thoughts. He looked at the outline of his reflection in the coffee. 

Sojiro had checked the carton . . . but he’d used the condensed milk last night.

Condensed milk didn’t curdle.

He opened his phone to do a quick search and found no evidence to the contrary. 

“It curdled?” he called back to Sojiro.

“Yeah, that’s what I said,” he called back from the stove.

Akira stared back into his coffee. He’d probably just been tired and used the wrong milk last night; he’d been so exhausted last night that he could have easily made that mistake but . . .

Hoping for respite from his overactive imagination, he pulled his phone from his pocket to check through messages. 

**Yusuke: Good morning.**

Akira couldn’t hide a smile at the text. Those two words meant so much more than ‘good morning’. Yusuke was telling him he was thinking of him, or more-so even, that he was concerned. He rarely ever texted him without some direct purpose or plan in mind no matter how small. His ‘good morning’ text was a patient inquiry, a request to Akira to lean on him should he find it necessary.

**Akira: Morning.**

**Yusuke: How are you?**

Akira thought about how to answer the question. He wasn’t  _ good _ or  _ fine _ . He was certainly alive, but that sounded dramatic. He could say he felt  _ awful _ , but that sounded equally so. 

**Akira: I’m not sure.**

He settled on a subtle, non-committal plea for help.

**Yusuke: I will get out of classes early to see you.**

**Akira: You don’t have to do that.**

**Yusuke: I wish to.**

**Akira: Where should we meet?**

**Yusuke: Is Leblanc unsatisfactory?**

‘No’ is what he almost typed, until he felt the ghostly presence of a detective on his right. 

**Akira: Yes.**

**Yusuke: You can come to my dormitory until about seven.**

**Akira: That works. Thanks.**

**Yusuke: It is my pleasure to spend time with you no matter the time nor place.**

Akira smiled, rolling his eyes, but blushing all the same. 

And that’s when it happened.

Right in front of him, the coffee cup he’d been drinking from only a moment before, had shattered, but instead of the tiny, quite nearly even pieces, flying in all directions or even scattering about the bartop, the broken bits of ceramic made a perfect circle on the counter the width of the mug the pieces had once formed. 

“What the hell?” 

Akira caught a towel thrown in his direction, and immediately began patting down the bartop to dry the surface, his eyes never straying from the circle of ceramic shards on the counter.

“What the hell happened?” Sojiro asked, voice just stern enough to draw Akira’s eyes upward to look up at his. 

Akira shook his head. “I don’t--I don’t know.”

“You’re not hurt, are you?”

Akira kept shaking his head, looking back at the ceramic pieces neither of them had disturbed when soaking up the coffee with their towels. “No.”

“”I’ve never seen anything like it. This some kind of trick you kids--”

“No, no it’s no trick. I didn’t-- I didn’t even touch it.”

“Ok, well, not a big deal. Clean it up and then eat your breakfast.”

Akira nodded, but just as Sojiro turned his back, he snapped a photo of the shards. 

This wasn’t normal. 

Something was . . . off. 

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this pretty fast; please forgive.


End file.
